Compare Arctic Ocean (2006) - Heard Island and McDonald Islands (2005)

Compare Arctic Ocean (2006) z Heard Island and McDonald Islands (2005)

	Arctic Ocean (2006)	Heard Island and McDonald Islands (2005)

Area	total: 14.056 million sq km note: includes Baffin Bay, Barents Sea, Beaufort Sea, Chukchi Sea, East Siberian Sea, Greenland Sea, Hudson Bay, Hudson Strait, Kara Sea, Laptev Sea, Northwest Passage, and other tributary water bodies	total: 412 sq km land: 412 sq km water: 0 sq km
Area - comparative	slightly less than 1.5 times the size of the US	slightly more than two times the size of Washington, DC
Background	The Arctic Ocean is the smallest of the world's five oceans (after the Pacific Ocean, Atlantic Ocean, Indian Ocean, and the recently delimited Southern Ocean). The Northwest Passage (US and Canada) and Northern Sea Route (Norway and Russia) are two important seasonal waterways. A sparse network of air, ocean, river, and land routes circumscribes the Arctic Ocean.	These uninhabited, barren, sub-Antarctic islands were transferred from the UK to Australia in 1947. Populated by large numbers of seal and bird species, the islands have been designated a nature preserve.
Climate	polar climate characterized by persistent cold and relatively narrow annual temperature ranges; winters characterized by continuous darkness, cold and stable weather conditions, and clear skies; summers characterized by continuous daylight, damp and foggy weather, and weak cyclones with rain or snow	antarctic
Coastline	45,389 km	101.9 km
Country name	-	conventional long form: Territory of Heard Island and McDonald Islands conventional short form: Heard Island and McDonald Islands
Dependency status	-	territory of Australia; administered from Canberra by the Australian Antarctic Division of the Department of the Environment and Heritage
Diplomatic representation from the US	-	none (territory of Australia)
Diplomatic representation in the US	-	none (territory of Australia)
Disputes - international	some maritime disputes (see littoral states)	none
Economy - overview	Economic activity is limited to the exploitation of natural resources, including petroleum, natural gas, fish, and seals.	No indigenous economic activity, but the Australian Government allows limited fishing around the islands.
Elevation extremes	lowest point: Fram Basin -4,665 m highest point: sea level 0 m	lowest point: Indian Ocean 0 m highest point: Mawson Peak, on Big Ben 2,745 m
Environment - current issues	endangered marine species include walruses and whales; fragile ecosystem slow to change and slow to recover from disruptions or damage; thinning polar icepack	NA
Flag description	-	the flag of Australia is used
Geographic coordinates	90 00 N, 0 00 E	53 06 S, 72 31 E
Geography - note	major chokepoint is the southern Chukchi Sea (northern access to the Pacific Ocean via the Bering Strait); strategic location between North America and Russia; shortest marine link between the extremes of eastern and western Russia; floating research stations operated by the US and Russia; maximum snow cover in March or April about 20 to 50 centimeters over the frozen ocean; snow cover lasts about 10 months	-
Irrigated land	-	0 sq km
Land boundaries	-	0 km
Land use	-	arable land: 0% permanent crops: 0% other: 100% (2001)
Legal system	-	the laws of Australia, where applicable, apply
Location	body of water between Europe, Asia, and North America, mostly north of the Arctic Circle	islands in the Indian Ocean, about two-thirds of the way from Madagascar to Antarctica
Map references	Arctic Region	Antarctic Region
Maritime claims	-	territorial sea: 12 nm exclusive fishing zone: 200 nm
Military - note	-	defense is the responsibility of Australia; Australia conducts fisheries patrols
Natural hazards	ice islands occasionally break away from northern Ellesmere Island; icebergs calved from glaciers in western Greenland and extreme northeastern Canada; permafrost in islands; virtually ice locked from October to June; ships subject to superstructure icing from October to May	Mawson Peak, an active volcano, is on Heard Island
Natural resources	sand and gravel aggregates, placer deposits, polymetallic nodules, oil and gas fields, fish, marine mammals (seals and whales)	fish
Population	-	uninhabited (July 2005 est.)
Ports and harbors	-	none; offshore anchorage only
Terrain	central surface covered by a perennial drifting polar icepack that, on average, is about 3 meters thick, although pressure ridges may be three times that thickness; clockwise drift pattern in the Beaufort Gyral Stream, but nearly straight-line movement from the New Siberian Islands (Russia) to Denmark Strait (between Greenland and Iceland); the icepack is surrounded by open seas during the summer, but more than doubles in size during the winter and extends to the encircling landmasses; the ocean floor is about 50% continental shelf (highest percentage of any ocean) with the remainder a central basin interrupted by three submarine ridges (Alpha Cordillera, Nansen Cordillera, and Lomonosov Ridge)	Heard Island - 80% ice-covered, bleak and mountainous, dominated by a large massif (Big Ben) and an active volcano (Mawson Peak); McDonald Islands - small and rocky
Transportation - note	sparse network of air, ocean, river, and land routes; the Northwest Passage (North America) and Northern Sea Route (Eurasia) are important seasonal waterways	-

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